NOT SAM'S FAULT THIS TIME
No, Miss Stevens was sorry that she could not go walking with him that
morning, which was the morning after the dance. She was very polite
about it, too; almost too polite. Her voice over the telephone was as
suave and as limpid as could possibly be, but there was a sort of
metallic glitter behind it, as it were.
No, she could not see him that afternoon either. She had made a series
of engagements, in fact, covering the entire day. Also, she regretted
to say, upon further solicitation, that she had made engagements
covering the entire following day.
No, she was not piqued about his last night's forgetfulness; by no
means; certainly not; how absurd!
She quite understood. He had been talking business with her father,
and naturally such a trifling detail as a dance with frivolous young
people would not occur to him.
Frivolous young people! This was the exact point of the conversation
at which Sam, with his ear glued to the receiver of the telephone and
no necessity for concealing the concerned expression on his
countenance, thought, in more or less of a panic, that he must really
be getting old, which was a good joke, inasmuch as nobody ever took him
to be over twenty-five. Heretofore his boyish appearance had worried
him because it rather stood in the way of business, but now he began to
fear that he was losing it; for he was nearing thirty!
Well, pleading was of no avail. He had to give it up. Reluctantly he
went out and took a solitary walk, then came in and religiously played
his two hours of tennis with Miss Westlake and Miss Hastings and
Tilloughby. Was he not on vacation, and must he not enjoy himself?
Just before he went in to luncheon, however, there was a telephone call
for him.
Miss Stevens was perplexed to know what divine intuition had told him
her obsession for maraschino chocolates. She had one in her fingers at
the very moment she was telephoning, and she was going to pop it into
her mouth while he talked. Being a mere man he could not realize how
delightfully refreshing was a maraschino chocolate.
Sam had a lively picture of that dainty confection between the tips of
her dainty fingers; he could see the white hand and the graceful wrist,
and then he could see those exquisitely curved red lips parting with a
flash of white teeth to receive the delicacy; and he had an impulse to
climb through the telephone.
A little bird had told him about her preference, he stated. He had
that little bird regularly in his employ to find out other preferences.
"I had those sent just to show you that I am not altogether absorbed in
business," he went on; "that I can think of other things. Have another
chocolate."
"I am," she laughingly said; "but I'm not going to eat them all. I'm
going to save one or two for you."
"Good," returned Sam in huge delight and relief. "I'll come over to
get them any time you say."
"All right," she gaily agreed. "As I told you this morning, I have an
engagement for this afternoon, but if you'll come over after luncheon
I'll try to find a half-hour or so for you anyhow."
Great blotches of perspiration sprang out on his forehead.
"Jinks!" he ejaculated. "You know, right after you telephoned me this
morning I made an engagement with Mr. Blackrock and Mr. Cuthbert and
Mr. Westlake, to go over some proposed incorporation papers."
"Oh, by all means, then, keep your engagement," she told him, and he
could feel the instant frigidity which returned to her tone. A
zero-like wave seemed to come right through the transmitter of the
telephone and chill the perspiration of his brow into a cold trickle.
"No, I'll see if I can not set that engagement off for a couple of
hours," he hastily informed her.
"By no means," she protested, more frigidly than before. "Come to
think of it, I don't believe I'd have time anyhow. In fact, I'm sure
that I would not. Mr. Hollis is calling me now. Good-by."
"Wait a minute," he called desperately into the telephone, but it was
dead, and there is nothing in this world so dead as the telephone from
which connection has been suddenly shut off.
Sam strode into the dining-room and went straight over to Blackrock's
table.
"I find I have some pressing business right after luncheon," he said,
bending over that gentleman's chair. "I can't possibly meet you at two
o'clock. Will four do you?"
"Why, certainly," Mr. Blackrock was kind enough to say, and he
furthermore agreed, with equal graciousness, to inform the others.
Sam ate his luncheon in worried silence, replying only in monosyllables
to the remarks of McComas, who sat at his table, and of Mrs. McComas,
who had taken quite a young-motherly fancy to him; and the amount that
he ate was so much at variance with his usual hearty appetite that even
the maid who waited on his table, a tall, gangling girl with a vinegar
face and a kind heart, worried for fear he might be sick, and added
unordered delicacies to his American plan meal. He went over to Hollis
Creek in the swiftest conveyance he could obtain, which was naturally
an auto, but he did not have 'Ennery for his chauffeur, of which he was
heartily glad, for 'Ennery might have wanted to talk.
On the porch of Hollis Creek Inn he found Princeman and Mr. Stevens in
earnest conversation. He knew what that meant. Princeman was already
discussing with Mr. Stevens the matter of control of the Marsh Pulp
Company. Princeman rose when Sam stepped up on the porch, and strolled
away from Mr. Stevens. He nodded pleasantly to Turner, and the latter,
returning the nod fully as pleasantly, was about to hurry on in search
of Miss Josephine, when Mr. Stevens checked him.
"Hello, Sam," he called. "I've just been waiting to see you."
"All right," said Sam. "I'll be around presently."
"No, but come here," insisted Mr. Stevens.
Sam cast a nervous glance about the grounds and along the side porch;
Miss Josephine most certainly was not among those present. He still
hesitated, impatient to get away.
"Just a minute, Sam," insisted Stevens. "I want to talk to you right
now."
With unwilling feet Sam went over.
"Sit down," directed Stevens, pushing forward a chair.
"What is it?" asked Sam, still standing.
"I have been talking with Princeman and Westlake about your Marsh Pulp
Company."
"Yes," inquired Sam nervously.
"And everybody seems to be most enthusiastic about it. Fact of the
matter is, my boy, I consider it a tremendous investment opportunity.
The only drawback there seems to be is in the matter of stock
distribution and voting power. I want you to explain this very fully
to me."
"I thought you were quite satisfied with our talk last night," returned
Sam, glancing hastily over his shoulder.
"I am, in so far as the investment goes, Sam. I've promised you that
I'd take a good block of stock, and you've promised to make room for me
in the company. I expect to go through with that, but I want to know
about this other phase of the matter before I get into any
entanglements with opposing factions. Now you sit right down there and
tell me about it."
Despairingly Sam sat down and proceeded briefly and concisely to
explain to him the various plans of incorporation which had been
proposed. Ten minutes later he almost groaned, as a trap, drawn by a
pair of handsome buckskin horses, driven by Princeman and containing
Miss Josephine, crunched upon the gravel driveway in front of the
porch. Miss Stevens greeted Mr. Turner very heartily indeed, Princeman
stopping for that purpose. Sam ran down and shook hands with her. Oh,
she was most cordial; just as cordial and polite as anybody he knew!
"I did not expect you at all," she said, "but I knew you were here, for
I saw you from the window as you came up the drive. Pleasant weather,
isn't it? Oh, papa!"
"Yes," answered Mr. Stevens ponderously from his place on the porch.
"Up on my dresser you will find a box of candy which Mr. Turner was
kind enough to have sent me, and he confesses that he has never tasted
maraschino chocolates. Won't you please run up and get them and let
Mr. Turner sample them?"
"Huh!" grunted Mr. Stevens. "If Sam Turner insists upon running me up
two flights of stairs on an errand of that sort, I suppose I'll have to
go. But he won't."
"You're lazy," she said to her father in affectionate banter, then,
with a wave of her hand and a bright nod to Mr. Turner, she was gone!
Sam trudged slowly up on the porch with the heart gone entirely out of
him for business; and yet, as he approached Mr. Stevens he pulled
himself together with a jerk. After all, she was gone, and he could
not bring her back, and in his talk with Stevens he had just approached
a grave and serious situation.
"The fact of the matter is, Mr. Stevens," said he as he sat down again,
"these people are the very people I want to get into my concern, but
they are old hands at the stock incorporation game, and even before
I've organized the company they are planning to get it out of my hands.
Now it is my scheme, mine and the kid brother's, and I don't propose to
allow that."
"Well, Sam," said Mr. Stevens slowly, "you know capital of late has had
a lot of experience with corporate business, and it isn't the
fashionable thing this year for the control and the capital to be in
separate hands--right at the very beginning."
This was the signal for the struggle, and Sam plunged earnestly into
the conflict. At three-fifteen he suddenly rose and made his adieus.
He would have liked to stay until Miss Josephine came back, so that he
could make one more desperate attempt to set himself right with her,
but there was that deferred engagement with Blackrock, and reluctantly
he whirled back to Meadow Brook.